Mailing lists are more important than Twitter for new bands

Social media is an incredibly useful tool for musicians to
recruit fans, but how do you start from zero? At the Great Escape festival, down on
Brighton's rainy seafront, a panel of experts recommended the good
old-fashioned mailing list.

"Social media is not the starting point," said moderator Chris
Cooke from CMU. "You need to have an initial fanbase."

Getting that fanbase is the tricky part. The easiest place to
begin, according to musician Chris
T-T, is with your family and friends and the local area. "Go
out and get your first couple of goes," he said, adding that open
mic nights can be a great way of getting live experience for singer-songwriters. He also recommended
putting on your own shows. "If you can do your own stuff right from
the first moment, you can create your own scene."

Once that's done, the panel recommended against immediately
pursuing the music industry, and instead said that artists should
work on perfecting their material. "Don't be afraid to spend a big
chunk of time practicing and planning," said Chris T-T. If you're
not sure if you're ready, ask other musicians that you trust in
your town, those on the next level above you, to come along to a
practice session. "You should think of your early recordings as
finished products," he added. "Make it as good as you can."

Once your songs are ready and you've begun gigging, that's when
the process really starts. "Have your online profile ready before
you go," said Cooke. "If you've got someone already in the band
ready to be an in-band PR person, that's really useful," added
Chris T-T. "Overmarket your early gigs, but don't play too
many, and always do the mailing list. You'd be amazed the number of
people who aren't doing it."

The problem with relying on social networks alone is that you're
at the mercy of their broader popularity. When everyone
abandoned MySpace, all the bands who relied on it for messaging
their fans completely lost the ability to contact them. Facebook
and Twitter are popular right now, but will they continue to be in
the future?

"Having a mailing list backup is your future safeguard," said
David Riley of Good
Lizard Media. That doesn't mean that you shouldn't use social
networks at all, though. On the contrary -- they can be enormously
useful if you use them right. "The most important thing is to do
the simple things and do the well, rather than trying to do a lot.
Spend a bit of time with (Facebook), writing well. Have a plan for
it."

He added that it doesn't necessarily have to be the frontman
that posts, or even someone in the band at all. "You can get
someone else to do it for you, but be clear about the voice you're
going to use," he added. "It has to be someone who can speak for
the band. It's got to be absolutely on-message from the get-go.
It's all about finding your voice, thinking about social media as
an extension of the persona of the band."

Eventually, you're going to want to attract press attention, but
be sure that the time is right for it. "You should really take your
time to make sure you're really producing your optimum material,"
said Debbie Ball of Create
Spark. "I recently advised a band to go it alone for a while,
to work their social networks and play a few gigs."

But she argues there's still value in smaller bands having a
relationship with a PR. "Sometimes a PR can give perspective on
when and how to do things."

Finally, the panel stressed the value of keeping an eye on any
analytics provided by the various services that bands use. "It's
great to have a data geek in your band, who's interested in
churning that data," said Chris T-T. "You might find that the top
ten to 12 percent of your fans are responsible for 80 to 90 percent
of your income.

"They're a small amount of people, but they're buying everything
that you do, coming to every show."

Edited by Nate Lanxon

Comments

and use "bcc" , its so awful when I get open mailing-lists from startups and parties, ready for the adress-book.